I was so impressed (not in a good way) with this image of a science article (submitted in 1980) by Dessler and Russell about Pluto's mass wasting that I decided to type it into a digital format. At first, I thought it was a bit of a tongue in cheek spoofing representation of Pluto but the more I read, the more I realized these two prominent scientists were dead serious. Image of the single page article >>>>>>>>>>> Below: typed copy in .docx format with original image.
Med size, needs MS Word, all images & formatting ![]()
Below: typed copy in .rtf format with author images
Large size, multiplatform viewability, some formating, ![]()
Below: typed copy in .txt format without images.
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Below large scale version of this image. >>>>>>
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Just 3 months before we arrived at Pluto (April 2015) another paper was written by M. Lund supporting this Dessler/Russell concept that Pluto was rapidly wasting away.
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Pluto was seen as a comet rapidly sublimating its volatile ices. This is likely why our estimates of Pluto's evaporating atmosphere were so grossly over exaggerated prior to arrival. I'm getting ahead of myself, lets take a closer look at this paper's conclusions and rational behind them. First let's meet the authors.
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1980 paper
<<<<<<<<<<<< Dr. Alexander J. Dessler Professor of Space Physics and Astronomy at Rice University in 1963. Selected as the chairman of Rice's Department of Space Physics and Astronomy, making him founder of the nation's first Space Science department. Dessler was awarded with the John Adam Fleming Medal for original research and technical leadership in science in 1993. |
1980 paper
>>>>>>>>>>>> Christopher T. Russell Professor of Geophysics and Space Physics in the Department of Earth and Space Sciences and the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (Space Science Center), at UCLA. Fellow of American Geophysical Union, American Association of the Advancement of Science, Royal Astronomical Society, Macelwane Award, American Geophysical Union |
Quote from Dessler and Russell paper.
Pluto is so distant that it is difficult to learn much about it from direct observation. For example, starting more than 100 years ago, astronomers first postulated its existence (That's not correct they postulated the existence of a planet 5500 times the mass of Pluto, I explain in more detail later) and began estimating its mass by assuming it was responsible for observed perturbations of the orbits of Neptune and Uranus. Succeeding estimates of mass were made by astronomers such as Pickering, Lowell, Nicholson, Mayall, Eckert, Brouwer and Clemence, with the latest estimate being made in 1978 by Christy and Harrington. At the recent meeting of the 50th Anniversary of the Discovery of Pluto, R. L. Duncombe and P. K. Seidelman assembled these earlier estimates of the mass of Pluto. We have plotted these (see figure), starting with the estimate by J. Babinel in 1848 which gave Pluto a mass 12 times that of Earth. The graph clearly illustrates that while Pluto was sighted in 1930, it was slighted (mass estimates significantly reduced) in the 1970’s. |
Prior to Pluto's discovery in 1930 and based solely on the perturbed orbits of Neptune and Uranus, Pluto was estimated to be 2, 4, 5.5, 6.7, 8.8, and 12 times the mass of Earth. In 1989 Binzel calculated Pluto's mass to be 0.0021655009 percent of Earth's mass which is pretty close to what we estimate it to be since the New Horizons flyby which is 0.00218 Earth's mass. What changed in 1989 that so radically altered our perception of Pluto's mass? Mutual occultation! |
Pluto and Charon passed in front of each other as we viewed their orbits.
This allowed for a much more accurate mass estimate consequently the estimates changed drastically from prior to that time but since 1989 all Pluto mass estimates have been very small and are relatively closely matched. In 1980 Dessler and Russell and their predecessors didn't have mutual occultation sighting events to draw from. This is a basic shift in knowledge not a basic change in Pluto's actual mass. |
The plot of mass versus time clearly indicates the impending disappearance of Pluto!
The mass of Pluto as a function of time is fit by a cosine function raised to the pi power. (cosine raised to pi, got it but what about linear and quadratic functions (not to worry, Lund's got that covered), just trust the cosine to pi function) It shows that Pluto’s mass was first estimated when it was near its heaviest, and its mass has been dropping alarmingly during the past few years. (pi nearly exactly predicts the year and month Lund will submit his paper in support of Dessler. Coincidence or is cosine to the pi a voodoo magic formula?) |
If we use our equation to extrapolate forward past 1984, we see that more interesting things are in store. (hang on to your hats people this ride down insanity lane is just getting started)
After 1984, the cosine function is negative, and we all know that a negative number raised to an irrational power is Complex! That is, Pluto reappears, but with a complex mass. (you say complex, I say crazy but why split hares in this rabbit hole?) The real part of this complex number is negative. While this idea may seem repellant to some (Nahhh please do gone on with your fabricated nonsense, I'm sooo intrigued), Pluto will be repellant to everything at this point (Pluto becomes an antigravity machine, please do tell I'm on the edge of my seat). The mass also has an imaginary part (just like the imaginary math that led us here), but we can’t imagine what effect this might have (that's because we are in Alice's Wonder Land now playing with math as though its reality). |
Back to the Dessler/Russell circus act
One can push mathematical extrapolations too far (You think? Don't get down on yourself guys you're doing fine). Perhaps Pluto will not go negative (Why not? In math a double negative makes a positive perhaps this is how Pluto reappears, two antigravity negative nonexistent massless objects collide and create a positive mass, makes sense to me after all we're in Alice's rabbit hole aren't we?); perhaps there is a physical explanation for this disappearing act (of course there is, its called poof science or is that spoof science?). |
While spacecraft have visited Venus, they have never visited a comet.) (Uh! We have now, (comet 67P) and guess what? Venus is not a comet)
Pluto may be a comet also – a fresh one, since it was sighted for the first time only in 1930. (what the hell are they implying now, that since we only spotted Pluto in 1930 it didn't exist prior to that, therefore its a fresh comet?) We know fresh comets ablate (evaporate/sublimate) as they approach the sun, for that is how cometary tails are born. (Yay! So you do know what a comet is after all.) |
We reassess earlier predictions of Pluto’s fate, and rule out the hypothesis that Pluto’s mass has been constant over the last century. (Hmmm let me guess, cosine function?)
We are able to fit linear and quadratic equations (whew for a minute there I thought they were going to use the cosine function) to Pluto’s mass as a function of both time and distance. The observations that will be made by New Horizons will help to determine (Just how dumb you truly are?) if we can expect Pluto to continue to shrink until it has negative mass, or if it will begin to increase in mass again. |
The fact is, these people show themselves as the charlatans (quacks) they often are.
I need to distinguish between real experimental/observational science and theoretical mathematical science as the two are as opposite as night and day. Experimental science like that of Hogenboom is based on repeatable experimental results and careful observations and is a science worthy of respect. Math, on the one hand, can help our comprehension in many ways, but on the other hand can also with one single digit (along with one single dipstick) lead us into Alice's rabbit hole where math fact is nothing but a fantasy of the mind. |
Take for example the Bill McKinnon's theoretical impactor that created Sputnik Planitia (SP) which physically couldn't possess enough mass to excavate a crater the size of SP, not to mention the delusional subsequent processes like creating an underground bulging water ocean or a geologically active crater or beaches within an impact crater or an inverted heated ocean or positive gravity anomalies in a negative 3 km topography zone in an anti Charon facing orientation. But with one speculative motion, these New Horizons scientists have sent other scientists with their mathematical models into motion in support of this speculative nonsense as they all chase their tails down a mathematical rabbit hole. |
Pluto, the Massive Lie
Pluto was discovered by shear chance. I know scientists want everyone to believe they calculated Pluto's location based on perturbations of Uranus and Neptune's orbit but that just isn't the case.
Their calculations led them to believe that Neptune's orbit was perturbed by an object somewhere around 12 Earth masses. Lowell calculated Pluto's mass needed to be 6.67 Earth masses to perturb Neptune and Uranus' orbits. Pluto is 0.00218 the mass of Earth or 5505 times smaller in mass than their calculations inferred their Planet X needed to be in order to perturb Neptune's orbit. Based on this, they concluded there should be a planet 6-12 times the mass of Earth in a particular location in the sky. Consequently they searched diligently for this super massive planet and serendipitously stumbled onto puny Pluto. Neptune's moon Triton is larger than Pluto. Is it even remotely possible that Triton is responsible for altering both Uranus and Neptune's orbits? |
Pluto, by chance, just happened to be in the place they were looking while seeking to locate this 12 Earth mass planet which their calculations indicated should exist.
By simple coincidence, in 1930 Pluto was aligned along its line of nodes which put it along the same orbital plane as most of the other planets. A few years earlier or later and it would have been far enough off its line of nodes that it would not have been discovered, at least not by Clyde Tombaugh. Pluto doesn't have the mass to do to Neptune what their calculations indicated and so was not perturbing Neptune's orbit (and certainly not Uranus' orbit), consequently it was not the planet they were looking for. |
Mike Brown is a smart feller (just as I'm sure, Lund, Dessler and Russell were/are) but I've read some of Brown's papers in which he makes predictions and statements that have turned out to be completely wrong.
I'm not interested in raining on Brown's parade but I'm afraid we may be traveling down the same historical road we were on in 1980 with Dessler and Russell. It wouldn't surprise me, however, if we stumble onto a new small body (much smaller than the equations would support) while looking for this new Planet X and take credit for calculating its presence in our solar system. |
When a scientist knows that a 150 to 250 km spherical impactor striking Pluto at a 60 degree angle couldn't possibly defy the
laws of physics and excavate 1300 x 900 x 150 km of material to create Sputnik Planitia with some flat beaches nor could it form a bulge in a subsurface ocean or a positive gravity anomaly with an incorrect alignment with Charon yet then present these ideas to an otherwise trusting world as a plausible scenario seems irresponsible at best. I find it more than annoying its frustrating and angering. Dessler and Russell, were completely off their rocker with their mathematical nonsense and grossly irresponsible, incomplete and irrational assertions about Pluto's mass wasting. |